I thought my child was taking the Lord’s name in vain. It was the opposite.

We’d come to the amusement park’s opening weekend as a birthday treat for our older son, and were having a grand time. We walked past the ride we jokingly refer to as the Flying Hamster Ball, and nine-year-old Jake suddenly declared that today was the day: he wanted to ride the Slingshot.

I was stunned; he’s not usually the more adventurous of the two boys when it comes to thrill rides, but I was willing to give it a try.

So here we were, after a long and agonizing wait, sitting in a large metal sphere being shot by a giant spring into the sky. We reached the furthest length of our bungee-like tethers and as we began the first descending bounce, we turned slowly over. We were now plummeting face-first toward the asphalt 200 feet below.

Which is when I realized Jake was muttering the Lord’s name repeatedly in near terror next to me.

When and where did he get that, I wondered. He’d recently become the bad word police in our house; chastising us for any swear word he heard. And yes, we do occasionally let out a bad word or two. And we’ve always taught our kids that there is a time and a place for a cathartic and well-timed h-word or d-word or even s-word, but that in most times and places they are vulgar and unnecessary. We seek to teach balance. But taking the Lord’s name in vain is off limits.

I didn’t chastise him; we were bouncing in a giant metal ball 200 feet in the air. But my heart hurt a little.

My irreverent 9-year-old, who struggles mightily to sit through worship, was praying.

The is the boy who asked, around age 3, “Where was I before I was borned?” And when I didn’t speak right away he answered his own question: “I was waiting in God’s heart.”

The same boy who stopped in the middle of the street once to pray for a lost dog that had run past us into the park.

I’ve been the Family Minister at our church since this child was 2 years old. He attends every church event and often helps set up and clean for them. He is equal parts feral church child and jaded minister’s kid; almost ridiculously at home in church even while he sometimes resents the constant influence of church on our familial life.

So why was I surprised to hear this child fervently praying? Maybe because we’ve lost track of daily prayer rituals at home as the boys get older.

It’s too easy, especially in the hectic pace of our day-to-day life with tweens and teens, to drop rituals like mealtime graces and bedtime prayers.

Even as a Family and Youth Minister, asking my boys to pray with me feels vaguely uncomfortable. Not just because I dread the rolling eyes and exasperation that are a staple of parenting this age group; because I fear making prayer just another thing we make them do, like homework and showers.

Yet I believe our kids need to know how to pray from their hearts. And we can show them the way. We can model the depth of vulnerability it takes to open ourselves completely to God’s mysterious power and presence, and the infinite peace that comes when God responds deep in our souls.

We can also talk about prayer: why we pray, what we believe happens when we pray, all the things we believe and hope but don’t know about how God listens and hears our prayers; and even our doubts about whether God is listening, and why praying might be a good idea anyway.

A few days ago, seemingly randomly, Jake announced that he prays – a lot – at school.

I wasn’t all that impressed at first; he attends a Catholic school.

But it turns out he wasn’t referring to Morning Prayer in class or weekly prayer in assembly or even the mass he attends several times a year. He was talking about impromptu prayer, extended straight from his heart to God’s.

We don’t do Morning Prayer or Compline at home. We’re inconsistent about grace at the dinner table. But we pray when we feel lost, afraid, sad, and grateful. We talk frankly about God’s grace and the great gifts of God’s creation.

Jake understands and believes that he can turn to Jesus in a moment of trouble and he will be helped, held, protected. In his heart, my son has a deep and abiding faith that God is, that Jesus loves him, and that the Holy Spirit is at work in his life.

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There are a few kids in my parish who regularly kneel on Sunday mornings for laying-on-of-hands for healing, after they have received communion. They go up by themselves. It always blows my mind. Thank you for this wonderful post. I love having a glimpse into your son’s spiritual life – and I think you need your head examined for going on that ride! What courage that took! Blessings and peace to you both.

I’m a bit of a thrill seeker…that’s why I work with youth and children 😉

What a wonder and a joy to have our kids seeking connection with God and with their faith communities – to understand at their own level what it means to have hands laid on them in prayer for healing. Thank you for sharing that lovely image!

When our first child was born with a brain injury, we had no idea what to expect. Back in the 1950’s there were no NICUs and most hospitals could only offer incubator care until the baby reached five pounds; then you took him home and did your best to navigate with the advice of your family doctor and what you found about preemies in magazines. Terry eventually was diagnosed with cerebal palsy and mental retardation. He grew into a happy and healthy baby, but was always way behind in attaining his developmental levels. He did learn basic sign language (my husband and I are both deaf), although he had not figured out how to speak, just babble…but he had language and could make his wants known. Later,a speech therapist told us that if he had not learned to sign,he probably would never have learned to talk, since he had learned the concept of communication by signing to us. We kept talking to him, since he had normal hearing, but he was three before he could speak.

When Terry was three, he acquired a baby sister, and decided that he was her advocate. When Joan woke up, I could not hear her cry but Terry did, and came to tell me, in sign, “baby cry.” He added his favorite toys to her crib, signing, “love baby.” He supervised her baths and insisted on stroking lotion onto her back himself.

Two years later Terry had a baby brother who he loved and cared for just as diligently. Now he could talk a bit, and sing-songed his own made-up verses to Bruce. Both Terry and Joan taught Bruce to sign and later to talk.

When Terry was six, he fell while chasing a ball out in the yard and hit his head on the curb of our driveway. He spent the next week in the hospital, being tested for head and brain injury. It was found that he had developed epilepsy as a result of the fall. He soon came home, and now we had some powerful drugs to administer and to monitor.

Terry demanded to be a Cub Scout. My husband, who had been a Boy Scout, became a Cub Master so he could be there if Terry had a seizure…the other leaders were fearful of dealing with that. Father and son, and, later, Bruce too, greatly enjoyed scouting. And our priest said that Terry should be confirmed with his age group. We explained that because Terry was retarded, we felt he wouldn’t understand the teaching in the pre-confirmation class and might be disruptive. No problem, Father said; he would personally teach Terry. So every Monday, Father picked Terry up after school, took him down to the church, and somehow was able to instruct Terry sufficiently that he was confirmed with his age group.

Later, when Terry was 16, we moved to Philadelphia. We joined both the deaf Episcopal congregation and our local Episcopal parish, where we enrolled the kids in Sunday School. We spent Sunday mornings at the “hearing” church and the afternoons at the deaf service. Terry approached the deaf priest and said that he wanted to be an acolyte. After talking it over with us, Father began training Terry for that ministry. Soon he was the regular acolyte for the deaf parish…and then he simply took on other responsibilities. He joined the deaf men’s group who set up folding tables and chairs for coffee hour and socials. If one of the deaf members missed services, he would go to Father to ask was that person sick? and if Father said yes, Terry would ask for prayers for that person. Terry felt more at home with the deaf than the hearing, and began attending deaf community affairs with us. When Terry died at age 22, pretty much the entire local deaf community attended his burial service, conducted jointly by deaf ad hearing priests. Afterwards, we received nearly a hundred letters from neighbors telling us what Terry had done to help them, things we had never known about.